Death's Door bs-17

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘I recognise the number; it’s noted in the case file. I’m dead certain, but we can call Tarvil in the office and have him check, if you like.’

  ‘I’ll trust your memory, Griff. That means the two victims did know each other.’

  ‘Is that significant?’

  ‘Who can say at this stage? All we’re doing is establishing a series of points of overlap between their lives. Until now, that’s been limited to the fact that they were both artists, and to them both having relationships with the man Dominic Padstow. But now we discover that they were acquainted. How did they meet? What brought them together? How close were they? We need to talk to Amy Noone, urgently, and we need to re-interview Stacey’s friends.’

  ‘And we sure as hell need to find Padstow.’

  ‘At the moment that’s our only objective, but let’s do it methodically. I want you to look at every file on that computer, and I want you to use that engagement diary to build me as complete a picture as possible of this woman’s life, as far back as it will take you. I don’t really care whether you do it here or whether you take the box back to the office, but the search needs to be complete. Copying selected items on to a flash drive isn’t going to be enough.’

  ‘No, I guess not,’ Montell conceded. ‘I’ll take it down to Leith in that case, but first, do you want to check Zrinka’s e-mails? ’

  ‘Yes, go on.’

  ‘She has direct broadband access; the computer logs on automatically, so if I just click here . . .’ He did as he said and watched as the dead woman’s mailbox opened. ‘Nothing,’ he growled, as he scanned the list that appeared, ‘other than bloody on-line newspapers. I’d have expected an artist to be a Guardian reader, but Zrinka went for the Telegraph and The Scotsman. Let’s see what she’s had recently.’ He clicked on a box marked ‘old e-mails’. A longer list appeared; he and Steele scanned down it, neither of them quite sure what they hoped to find. ‘I’ll go through these one by one at the office, boss,’ said Montell.

  ‘You’ll still be able to access through our systems?’

  ‘No problem: I won’t change her set-up.’

  ‘Right, close up and let’s go.’ Steele straightened up, and moved towards the door.

  ‘Okay. Hey, wait a minute,’ the detective constable exclaimed. ‘She’s got Messenger: it’s signed on automatically. That means she has a secondary address, and I should,’ he clicked the icon, ‘be able to open it.’ The program took longer to display on screen than its predecessor, but as it did, a grin spread across the South African’s face. ‘She’s got mail!’ he called out. ‘And from her brother at that.’

  ‘God,’ the inspector sighed, ‘I’ve been trying to trace that man since we left his parents this morning, and drawing blanks everywhere. I sourced his office number and called that, but his secretary told me that he was away on a business trip and out of touch.’

  ‘Doesn’t he have a mobile?’

  ‘She said that he doesn’t. Hard to believe in this day and age, but I don’t think she was lying to me. She said that Mr Barnes was away sourcing suppliers and that he keeps trips like that absolutely secret, so that his competitors don’t find out who he’s dealing with. All I could do was ask her to ask him to make contact with us whenever he next got in touch. His mother’s secretary gave me a home phone number for him in London. I rang that too, but all I got was the same answer-machine that she had earlier. Now the bugger pops up here out of the blue. Open it, and let’s see what he’s telling her.’

  Montell double-clicked the sender name and waited for the seconds the message took to open. ‘The title is “Keeping in touch”, ’ he began ‘and it reads,

  ‘Hi Sis

  I’m on the move, so this will have to be a quick message. I hope you’re well and selling your pictures like crazy. It was good, what you told me about the man being in touch about one of your pictures. You make a friend like him and word will spread around town. Just don’t let him get too friendly! I can’t tell you often enough, you can’t trust men, but you know that from your own experience. I’m glad it seems to be working out for you with your new boyfriend. He has a good background. After you told me about him I checked out his father, and he seems like quite a man. He was very successful in business and before that he was a war hero. I wish our own dad was more like him. We know what he did when he saw war on the horizon.

  I’m out of the country just now, finishing up a piece of business. I expect it to be taken care of in the next couple of days. Once it is, maybe I’ll come to Edinburgh to see you and your little friend, and meet Harry.

  Love, Dražen.’

  ‘Looks like his secretary was telling the truth, boss.’

  ‘I never doubted her. Is the message dated?’

  ‘According to the heading it was sent today, at twelve fifty GMT.’

  ‘That’s well after the press conference. Griff, I want you to send a reply. Tell him it’s from me, give him our office address, phone number and e-mail, and tell him that when he picks it up, he should get in touch with us as soon as possible.’

  Montell’s fingers were flashing on the keyboard even before he had finished speaking. ‘I’m ahead of you, boss. I wonder who the man was that Dražen mentioned,’ he added idly, as he worked.

  ‘Maybe Zrinka’s old e-mails will tell us. Finish up and let’s get back to the office, so you can start to work on them, and on any other surprises that might be in there.’

  Thirty-eight

  There was nothing about the process of the MRI scan that was frightening, in itself, to a mature, sensible woman. She lay undressed, but under a sheet, on a movable bed, as it passed slowly through a giant, circular magnet. She kept absolutely still, as she had been told was necessary. The supervisor had offered her a mild sedative to help her, but she had declined. She felt no discomfort, no pain, as it progressed, and she was sure that her child was equally unaffected, since she felt no kicking or undue movement within her. She willed herself to concentrate on the scan itself, and to think of nothing else; she might have dropped off to sleep had it not been for the loud repetitive clicking that signalled each successive stage. Finally it was over. She would have guessed that she had been under the magnet’s beam for less than half an hour, and yet a check of the clock on the wall, as she slipped on the hospital-issue dressing-gown, told her that fifty minutes had elapsed.

  But, still, Maggie Rose was apprehensive, as she had been from the moment that she had seen Fine waiting for her in the reception area. She was strong-willed and had been able, if not to banish her fears, then at least to pack them away in a box at the back of her mind, but his presence . . . not routine, whatever he said . . . coupled with the disturbing family history that Sylvia Thorpe’s research had uncovered, had unlocked it and set them free to push everything else aside.

  She frowned as she dressed, rubbing her hand idly over her bump as she fastened the elasticated uniform trousers that had been made specially for her. She was still frowning as she returned to the waiting area. A nurse offered her a cup of tea and a biscuit, and she accepted, then left them untouched on the table beside her. She was so preoccupied that she failed to see Mr Fine until he was standing in front of her, hair slicked back, pencil moustache as neat as ever, round spectacles perched on the bridge of his nose.

  ‘Would you like to come with me, please, Mrs Steele?’ he said, in a voice that sounded reassuring, but was in total contrast to the signals that all his years of professional practice could not prevent from showing in his eyes. She followed him without a word, along the corridor and into a small narrow room with a curtained window, an examination table, a backlit display screen and three chairs, one of which was behind a desk.

  Several transparencies were attached to the board, brightly coloured cross-sections of a human body that she knew to be hers. She stared at them, almost slipping as she lowered herself on to one of the two patient chairs. Fine put out a hand to steady her, then took the other himself, beside the board.


  He pointed at the images. ‘I could spend a while going through these in detail with you, Mrs Steele, as I’ve just done with my colleague Dr Goyle, our most senior consultant radiologist. I could point out to you what we’ve found, but it wouldn’t mean anything to you, since it takes a couple of years’ training and then several more years’ experience to be able to interpret these pictures. So I’ll just tell you what the position is.’

  Maggie’s heart was hammering. She hugged her abdomen, as if she was protecting her child, as, subconsciously, she was.

  The consultant read her mind; he waited, giving her time to control herself, then caught her eyes, holding her attention. ‘The scan,’ he continued slowly, ‘has detected abnormalities in both of your ovaries, and in your Fallopian tubes. There is also a shadow on your uterus. For one hundred per cent certainty we’d need to do a biopsy, but neither Dr Goyle nor I are in any real doubt. We believe that you are suffering from what is called an epithelial ovarian carcinoma. I’m very sorry, Mrs Steele, but that’s the long way of saying that you have ovarian cancer.’

  Maggie felt all of the colour drain from her face. ‘Jesus,’ she whispered. She had known fear throughout her life, and violence on more than one occasion, as an adult and as a child, but she realised that before it had always been mixed with anger, and that until that moment she had never felt true terror.

  ‘Yes,’ said Fine.

  ‘The baby?’ Her voice trembled.

  ‘Your child is unaffected.’

  Her breath exploded from her in a huge sigh, and she felt herself relax, a little. ‘Oh, thank you for that,’ she gasped.

  Fine gazed at her kindly. ‘It’s not a matter for thanks.’

  ‘I wasn’t talking to you,’ she told him, with a very faint smile: it showed for only a second or two, before her frown returned. ‘That’s my diagnosis, but what’s my prognosis?’

  ‘It’s much more positive than it might have been,’ he replied. ‘Your condition has been detected fairly early, which isn’t usually the case with this type of disease. With immediate intervention and a subsequent course of treatment, still to be determined, you have an excellent chance of recovery.’

  ‘What do you mean by intervention?’

  ‘We’ll have to end your pregnancy now, and operate to remove your ovaries, tubes, womb and any other troublesome tissue that might have been hidden from the scan.’

  ‘Terminate my pregnancy?’ Maggie exclaimed. ‘But I have eleven weeks to go.’

  ‘Nonetheless, Mrs Steele, we have to act immediately.’

  ‘By killing my child?’

  ‘Your child has a fair chance of survival, even with such an early delivery.’

  ‘But you’ve just told me she’s small.’

  ‘Yes, but she’s viable.’

  ‘What does she weigh, right now?’

  ‘Maybe two and a half pounds . . .’ he paused ‘. . . but babies of that size regularly survive nowadays.’

  ‘Maybe, you’re saying to me. As in “maybe but she could be less”, right?’

  ‘True,’ Fine admitted. ‘She could weigh less than a kilo just now.’

  ‘And then what would her chances of survival be?’

  ‘To be honest, they’d be poor.’

  ‘And if I carry her full term?’

  ‘She would be six pounds at birth, possibly as much as seven; most of a baby’s weight is gained in the final stages. However, that could be affected by the development of your condition: she might grow more slowly than normal.’

  ‘Could my disease spread to her?’

  ‘Technically, yes.’

  She stared at Fine. ‘And practically?’

  ‘Practically, the chances of that happening are minimal. Such an occurrence would be so rare that it would make the medical journals.’

  ‘Could you give me chemotherapy, or radiotherapy, without harming her?’

  ‘Absolutely not, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Yet we’re agreed that there is a far greater risk to my baby’s life by curtailing my pregnancy than by continuing it?’

  ‘That is true. But, Mrs Steele, the same applies to you in reverse. I’ve been comparing your ultrasounds, and while they’re not definitive, they do indicate that your cancer is developing swiftly, as I’d expect it to. The growths in your Fallopian tubes are metastases, secondary tumours. That’s not a good sign, but it’s manageable. However, if there is a spread beyond the pelvic region, that will not be.’

  ‘Manageable? Let’s be more specific than that. Given my present condition, what are my five-year survival chances? Quote me figures; I can look them up on the Internet, I’m sure.’

  For the first time, Fine looked down, away from her. ‘Overall,’ he replied, ‘studies show less than fifty per cent. That’s allowing for all age groups, all stages of detection.’

  ‘In my case, if I follow your advice, what will the odds be?’

  ‘I’d love to say better than even, but I can’t.’

  ‘So what it comes down to is this. If I risk my daughter’s life, and somehow she overcomes the odds against her, survives and grows into a healthy child, I’m unlikely to be around to see her start primary school. Or, to put it another way, if I do what you say, the balance of probability is that my husband will lose both his wife and child.’

  ‘Maybe, but, Mrs Steele . . .’

  ‘Forget the bloody maybes. Yes or no?’

  ‘Yes, but every case is different. These are statistics. Individual cases often throw up surprising outcomes.’

  It was Maggie’s turn to draw his eyes back to hers. ‘With respect,’ she said, not unkindly, ‘you’re asking me to gamble my child’s life, and I will not, I cannot do that. I will carry her either full term or until you can put your hand on your heart and tell me that she can be delivered without risk above the norm. After that you can hollow me out, throw all the shit you like at me, and I will fight this disease with everything I have.’

  ‘If that’s your decision,’ the consultant replied, ‘I have to respect it.’

  ‘I know, but thanks for saying so. In the meantime, is there anything I can do to slow this thing down?’

  ‘Rest; that’s all. Do you have domestic help?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then my advice is that you get a cleaner in, do your food shopping online, and generally avoid physical activity.’

  ‘Including . . .?’

  ‘Yes, I’m afraid so, that too.’ He looked at her earnestly. ‘Mrs Steele, Margaret: it might be a good idea if you asked your husband to come and see me, to let me explain what’s happening.’

  Her eyes flashed, and narrowed. ‘No!’ she snapped. ‘Absolutely not. My husband is out there right now trying to catch a man who has murdered, so far, three people, and who may well be planning to kill even more. He needs to focus on that, not to be watching me every day for signs of deterioration. I love Stevie, I know the man he is, and I believe that if I put my decision to him, he’d back me up. He’ll find out when he has to. In the meantime I forbid you to contact him, or to discuss my condition with him. If you do that behind my back, you’ll find out why I made chief superintendent at my age. Is that clear?’

  Fine smiled. ‘As clear as day.’ He rose to his feet. ‘Come on with me and I’ll make you a series of appointments. Come by taxi; it’ll be cheaper than parking in this bloody place. If nothing else, I’m going to watch you and your child like a hawk in these coming weeks.’

  Thirty-nine

  I wasn’t surprised when you rang me. I’ve been expecting you since lunchtime.’ Amy Noone’s wide eyes and pale face were witnesses to her claim. As she perched on the edge of her couch, she clutched a can of Irn-Bru, white-knuckled.

  ‘How did you find out?’ Steele asked her.

  ‘I was in the middle of shampooing a customer,’ she told him, ‘and STV was on the television like always. The news was on, then the woman said they were switching to Edinburgh, and two men walked in front of a camera. I wasn’t really
listening until I saw that one of them was Zrinka’s dad. I knew him right away, from a photo she has in her flat. And then the other one, the big guy with the nice black curly hair, said that Zrinka was the girl that was murdered on the beach. I just screamed.’ She pressed the cold can to her forehead. ‘God knows what would have happened if I’d been cutting the woman’s hair at the time, instead of just washing it. Mervyn, the boss, was at the other end of the salon; he came rushing up thinking I’d scalded her or something, then the man said something else about Zrinka being shot and he screamed too. Then Harry’s name was mentioned, and the pair of us were in floods of tears.

  Mervyn told me I should go home; gay blokes are kind that way. He said he’d finish off my customer, and cancel as many of the afternoon appointments as he could.’

  ‘He knew them too?’

  ‘Of course he did. Zrinka was a customer. That’s how she and I met; she came into the salon a year and a half ago, no, maybe a bit more, and Mervyn gave her to me. She said that she wanted a makeover to surprise her boyfriend. I told her that if he didn’t appreciate her as she was, he needed a mental makeover, or maybe changing altogether. She laughed at that, and we just got on from there.’

  ‘Can you tell us anything about the boyfriend?’ Tarvil Singh asked her.

  ‘Dominic?’ Amy frowned. ‘I never liked him. I never trusted him either.’

  ‘Why? Did he come on to you?’

  She snorted. ‘In his dreams! Nah, he just didnae seem right for her. He was older than her for a start. Zrinka was just twenty-two then, and he must have been into his thirties. She liked a laugh, and he was a dour bastard, unless he was making an effort, and he never did, unless she was looking at him.’

  ‘Do you know why they broke up?’

  ‘No, Zrinka never let on, not even when I asked her. All that I know is that she chucked him out, no week’s notice, nothing. One day I went to see her and he was there. Next day he was gone.’

  ‘Her mother told us that they broke up on good terms,’ said Steele.